After year leading fight, Afghan forces see 'mixed' results

A year after officially taking over the fight against Taliban and other insurgent forces in Afghanistan, local security troops have scored only "mixed results," a US general said today.
Despite billions of dollars in training, donated equipment and assistance over more than a decade, Afghan troops still are having trouble in many situations, said Brigadier General Wilson Shoffner, a top spokesman for the US military in Afghanistan.
"Our assessment of their performance in 2015 is that they had mixed results," Shoffner told Pentagon reporters in a video call.
Thirteen years after a US-led coalition invaded Afghanistan with the goal of toppling the Taliban and smashing Al-Qaeda, local Afghan forces began leading the fight at the start of 2015, with thousands of Western troops remaining in a "train, advise and assist" role.

Shoffner said the Afghans had done "fairly well" whenever they conducted planned operations, but they performed poorly in response to crisis situations.
"It required more time to get forces in position, and then it required more time to stabilize the situation," he said.
"That remains one of their weaknesses and one of the areas they're going to have to continue to focus on into 2016," he added.
Still, he noted Afghan special forces troops had become "increasingly capable" and cited two raids where they performed "flawlessly.